


Easier to Say

by preciouslittleingenue



Category: Outlander (TV), Outlander Series - Diana Gabaldon
Genre: Deleted Scenes, Faith Mention, Father-Daughter Relationship, Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-15
Updated: 2020-09-15
Packaged: 2021-03-06 16:42:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,242
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26482096
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/preciouslittleingenue/pseuds/preciouslittleingenue
Summary: “I told yer mother once, nothing is ever lost, only changed. She told me it was the uh, first law of thermodynamics. I said it was faith.”She smirked at him, so familiar it was like looking into a mirror. “It’s easier to say.”He chuckled. “Harder to put into practice.” He reached out and cupped her cheek. “But ye must, leannan.”She leaned into his touch, smiling weakly at him, and then she became lost in thought.“That was…her name. Wasn’t it?”Something ice cold gripped Jamie’s heart, and he felt his very blood still inside of him.“Aye. Yer sister.”
Relationships: Jamie Fraser & Brianna Randall Fraser MacKenzie
Comments: 28
Kudos: 188





	Easier to Say

**Author's Note:**

> When that deleted scene of Jamie/Brianna content dropped, I was floored with inspiration. Jamie saying the word "faith" to Brianna set me off, and this was born.

“I told yer mother once, nothing is ever lost, only changed. She told me it was the uh, first law of thermodynamics. I said it was faith.”

She smirked at him, so familiar it was like looking into a mirror. “It’s easier to say.”

He chuckled. “Harder to put into practice.” He reached out and cupped her cheek. “But ye must, _leannan_.”

She leaned into his touch, smiling weakly at him, and then she became lost in thought.

“That was…her name. Wasn’t it?”

Something ice cold gripped Jamie’s heart, and he felt his very blood still inside of him.

“Aye. Yer sister.”

They didn’t speak of her very often; they couldn’t. Even after nearly thirty years, it was still too raw a wound to pick at. Claire still struggled to make it through each birthday, he knew. He could see it. And even then, they needn’t speak of it. They each knew the burdens the other carried, and they need only take comfort in touches, in soothing embraces.

He thought perhaps the last time he’d said her name was the day that Claire had returned.

_“She has your red hair."_

_“Like her sister. Faith.”_

“I, um, I didn’t know,” Brianna said. “Mama never told me until right before she went back to you. It was…really hard for her to talk about.” She pursed her lips and furrowed her brow. “I don’t think she even really wanted to. But she said I deserved to know I had a sister, and she’d never get the chance to say it again.”

Jamie nodded, lowering his hand to tenderly grip her knee. “She doesna speak of it to anyone. Even me. It’s an unspoken understanding between us, I suppose. She’s in our hearts wi’out needing to say it aloud.”

Brianna dipped her head, thinking silently. Imagining the pain her mother must have been in…it was almost too much. Now that she was a mother herself, even the mere thought of something happening to Jemmy was enough to make her feral.

“How did she…” Brianna spoke before she realized, and then had to consciously try to finish her sentence. “Survive it? Both of you, really.”

Jamie’s jaw hardened, but his eyes remained soft as they gazed upon the daughter that lived, warm beneath his hands.

“Together,” he answered, his eyes far off, looking past her. He could see _her_ just beyond, his young bride, _broken_ to pieces, spitting that she _hated him_.

“I almost lost her, ye ken,” Jamie said, his throat constricting painfully. “She lived, aye. But she was almost lost to me forever. I coulda reach her in that…that place that she was in. And I was…drowning in my own pain. But together, we…” Jamie hesitantly slid his hand to cover hers, and without hesitation, Brianna laced their fingers together and looked into his eyes. “We crawled out. Fer a time she wasna… _we_ werena ourselves. As ye say Roger isna.”

“It’s hard to…imagine that,” Brianna said softly. “You guys losing each other.”

“We did, though. Wee Faith carried our hearts away wi’ her. We did lose parts of each other that we canna get back.”

Brianna nodded in understanding.

“Back then, I thought it was my whole heart she took wi’ her,” Jamie went on, his eyes misting over. “But wi’ time, I remembered how to love my wife, my son.”

Brianna smiled warmly. _Fergus_.

“And you, _m’annsachd._ ” He gave her fingers a squeeze. “Christ, ye were such a blessing before I could even look upon yer face. Our miracle.”

Brianna felt her own eyes start to water. “Mama said that you…loved me. A lot. Even though you never met me.” She felt shame burning her from the inside out, remembering the hateful, terrible things she’d said to her mother that day. “I didn’t get it. I didn’t believe her. Not at first.” She shook her head slightly, trying to clear her mind of echoes of her own words. “She said you sent her… _us_ away. For me.”

“It’s true.”

Brianna swallowed thickly. “I get it now.”

Her heart leapt into her throat as she watched a single tear trickle down his cheek, her strong, warrior of a father. It was her turn to cup his cheek, to brush his tear away. He sighed heavily and pulled her into his arms, pressing her head into his chest.

“I’m sorry, Da. For your loss.”

Jamie sighed, a great, stuttering shudder, and he fervently kissed the top of her head.

“If you ever talk to Mama about it again…could you tell her for me?”

“Aye. I can.”

“I don’t want to make her upset by bringing it up,” Brianna continued. “But I…I want her to know that I…I don’t know. I didn’t really say anything when she first told me. It felt…weird. And before that I was so…horrible to her. I don’t know.” She settled her head on his shoulder, and he adjusted his arms, holding her opposite shoulder. “I guess it’s too late to comfort her for something that happened before I was born.”

“No, Brianna. It’s not.” He rubbed her upper arm. “It’ll mean a great deal to her when I tell her what ye’ve said.”

They sat in comforting silence for a bit, neither knowing what to say just yet.

“She’d have been twenty-seven, this past May,” Jamie broke the silence. “She’d have bairns of her own as well, most like. Sweet wee things like yours. Like she was.”

Brianna smiled sadly, squeezing his knee in sympathy.

“I didn’t even realize…what was the day?”

“The twelfth.”

“Oh.” Brianna’s nose wrinkled in thought. “I didn’t…notice anything.”

“I usually take a few quiet moments to myself. It’s been easier since yer mother returned to me. She’s…stronger than I am, I think. Needs to push through. Not ignore, just…keep it in the back of her mind. Quietly.”

“Yeah.” Brianna thought back to all the years of watching her mother float through life as a shell of a woman, never ignoring her grief, but never stopping either. Getting a medical degree, raising a child.

“You’re strong too, you know,” she said after some time. “And I don’t mean muscle. That’s obvious.” They both chuckled softly. “I mean…the way Mama is strong. You do have that, too.”

She picked her head up off his shoulder and looked in his eyes again. “It takes a lot of strength to do what you did. Give up the love of your life, give up…me. Even after you’d already lost a child. To put yourself through it again. That’s…strength, Da.”

His eyes misted over again, and he had to concentrate all his strength into not weeping like a bairn at his daughter’s loving declaration.

“Thank ye, lass. Truly.”

Brianna’s mind wandered back to a dark memory, a gray place, stones and dirt and misery.

_“You’re my hero.”_

It had been the truth. Frank was her father in every sense of the word except one for eighteen years of her life. And nothing could change that. She loved him, she always would.

But the man who sat before her now, who had the one claim to her that Frank didn’t, had so quickly become her father in every other sense as well. Overcome with affection, she leaned in and kissed his cheek before wrapping her arms around his neck.

“You’re my hero too, Da.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!


End file.
